Football structure has to change, warn FRC

Football Review Committee (FRC) chairman Eugene McGee says the All-Ireland SFC structure can’t afford to continue as it is. Offaly’s 1982 All-Ireland winning manager believes players will turn their backs on the competition if the current system is maintained.

He hopes his committee’s report, which will be delivered to the GAA in November, will provide a solution, or at least a first step, towards improving the composition of the championship.

“We have the standard open draw, we have the Champions League style, but then there are people who have gone to extraordinary lengths to plan the whole season from January to November on a completely different championship.

“If nothing else, it’ll keep people thinking about this because obviously change has to come, but it’s not going to change next week. Maybe this will be a major plank, at least being a catalyst for change. That’s the least we can hope for.

“In 10 years’ time, we surely won’t be having the same provincial championship. Mayo playing their first championship match eight weeks after Longford – that sort of stuff won’t go on. Young men won’t put with that today. That’s not going to happen.”

He added: “Mayo are a good example because all they had to do was beat Leitrim to get into the last 12. Compared to what Kildare or Kerry have done, worse still Longford and Tipperary, the imbalance of it, the inequity is obviously getting to a lot of people.”

Although it had initially been ruled out, the structure of the championship has come under the remit of the FRC. McGee said the inequity between large and small counties is a concern for people as well as the spending power of each.

“One of the things we will be looking at, and we discussed this with the GPA, is the financial aspect of the weaker counties.

“The resources they have are grossly unequal compared to the rich counties. You can spend a million to win the All-Ireland but there’s no way Longford or Leitrim can spend a million. They’ll never have it.”

McGee was keen to emphasise he will remain neutral, but empirical evidence gathered by the FRC shows the ratio of hand-passes to foot-passes has increased from a 1:1 ratio in the 70’s to 3:1 one.

“If that were to increase it could mean it’d be 5:1 in 10 years’ time so only 20% of the play would be with the foot. If that were to happen today there’d be a bit of a revolution. People would say, ‘Jesus, what’s going on?’ But it’s quite likely to happen because the coaches may decide to keep at the hand-pass so therefore in 10 years time it could be even 90%. People don’t realise how quickly these things come in.

“I was involved in the 70’s with the Kerry-Dublin stuff and people said the hand-pass would be a one-day wonder. But it’s there and it’s still there and it went from strength to strength because it worked for Dublin and especially for Kerry.”

McGee said there has been already an extraordinary number of people in touch with the FRC to get rid of the pick-up rule. He is also aware there is opposition towards GAA president Liam O’Neill’s establishment of the committee.

Meanwhile, McGee also said the FRC will likely recommend the GAA establish a statistics services for its games.